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Summary
On episode 323 of 40+ Fitness, Coach Allan sits down with Janet Newman, an Austin, Texas based consultant with a PhD in psychology and a master’s degree in social work, whose own health struggles and her husband’s led her to research hidden environmental toxins and write the book Living in the Chemical Age.
Janet explains her “silo” concept: chemical exposures accumulate in the body layer by layer, and once that silo overflows, the result shows up as disease or troublesome symptoms.
The conversation gets practical, walking through what’s actually in tap and bottled water, how to pick a safer sunscreen and insect repellent, and how to recognize and remediate mold, including a mold horror story from Allan’s own home.
Links
- https://livinginthechemicalage.com
- https://fluoridealert.org
Key Takeaways
- Toxins accumulate in the body like a filling silo. Janet says the body can handle a certain load of man-made chemicals, but once intake outpaces what we can excrete, the excess piles up until it manifests as skin problems, headaches, inflammation, or disease.
- Municipal tap water isn’t filtered for everything in it. Standard treatment systems weren’t built to remove things like prescription drug residue, birth control byproducts, or industrial runoff, so Janet recommends getting your water professionally tested before choosing a filter.
- Bottled water isn’t automatically safer than tap. PET plastic (the number 1 recycling symbol) is an endocrine disruptor that leaches into water when it gets hot, bottles shed microplastic particles from the cap area, and bottlers aren’t required to disclose their water testing results.
- Fluoride in drinking water isn’t the same fluoride linked to strong teeth. The naturally occurring calcium fluoride tied to healthy teeth in a 1940s study is different from the sodium fluoride added to municipal water today, a fertilizer and aluminum industry byproduct linked to lower IQ, memory problems, and dental fluorosis (mottled white spots on teeth).
- Mineral sunscreens are the safer choice over chemical ones. Chemical sunscreens absorb into the bloodstream, have been linked to free radical damage, and contribute to coral reef bleaching, while zinc oxide sunscreen sits on top of the skin and is Janet’s top recommendation.
- DEET is stronger than most people need for backyard mosquito protection. Janet notes DEET can melt synthetic fabric and damage paint, so for high-risk travel she recommends picaridin (derived from black pepper, as effective as DEET without the same safety concerns), and for everyday use, oil of lemon eucalyptus, which masks the body scent mosquitoes are drawn to instead of poisoning them off.
- Mold needs only 24 hours and four common conditions to start growing. Moisture, oxygen, a temperature between 40 and 100 degrees, and a nutrient source like drywall or carpet are usually all present in a home, so a controllable dehumidifier set near 45 percent humidity is a first line of defense.
- Mold often shows no smell and produces wildly different symptoms in different people. Janet and her husband were both exposed to mold in their home, but he developed autoimmune arthritis symptoms while she got migraines and brain fog, so different presentations delayed the diagnosis until a functional medicine doctor connected the timing to their new house.
- You can’t eliminate every toxin, but you can shrink your daily burden. Janet’s approach is substitution, not perfection: swap out one product at a time (filtered water in a stainless or glass bottle instead of plastic, mineral sunscreen instead of chemical) to steadily reduce what fills the silo.
“I always say, filter your water at home, bring it in a stainless steel or a glass bottle and carry that around with you every day.”
Janet Newman
